Sounds and Style

From day one on MESRINE I felt that there were a couple of signature sounds I new had to be used to evoke the images associated with France and the 1970’s.The first and obvious choice was the sound of the French accordion.
Question; who played the accordion on MESRINE?
We call him called Jean Luc, it’s not his real name but due the controversial nature of MESRINE he politely asked to remain anonymous.
The second group of sounds are the electric piano, and Fender bass (played by myself plectrum style) to evoke all the 1970’s action.
I decided that an orchestral backdrop of strings and horns would be ideal for creating the emotional soundscape for most of the songs.
There is also a selection of songs were I have purposely used a disco drum beat to hint at the dance rhythms that were very popular during the mid 1970’s.
The sound of the electric guitar is placed strategically throughout MESRINE , but I intentionally kept it as an additional sound texture and not as a featured instrument.



The voice of the people

A few words on the singers who worked on the MESRINE recording.
All the performers brought an extremely varied pot of experience to the project, I had worked with Nadine on a few music projects since 2001 and knew her European style of singing would be perfect for the ‘girlfriend’s’ voice, but more importantly she has a background in acting that was perfect for performing the songs.
Christopher Nott and I have worked together on music projects for more years than I dare tell you! Chris was first my choice to sing some of the male vocals, he has a background of performing a wide style of songs, an interest in musical theatre and top of the list… he’s a very good friend.
One of the more unusual roles was that of the voice of ‘Paris’. Andrew had heard mezzo soprano Rachel Smith performing live and told me of the amazing quality, power and emotion of her voice. Rachel came along to the studio and performed some wonderful vocals on sections of MESRINE, especially the haunting background voice on ‘Beautiful Day To Die’ and the perfect and inspiring vocal on ‘Lady Of The Seine’.
Andrew also suggested Helen Lowe for the voice of the television announcer. As with Rachel, Helens voice was perfect for the role and took the song ‘And In Other News’ onto a higher level than either Andrew or I ever imagined.



Special thanks

A few quick words on additional contributors to the songs.
French culture and language expert Brian Murphy helped translate a selection of English into the correct style of the French language and Jo Mainwaring also added a few lines of female dialogue in her wonderfully calm, soft vocal tones.

Steve Wilson 2009